Ventura County spelling bee champ likes dissecting root words

TROY HARVEY/THE STAR
Sam Coats eats pizza with his classmates during a party held in his honor at Cabrillo Middle School in Ventura. Coats will be heading to this week’s Scripps National Spelling Bee near Washington, D.C.

Ventura County Star

Sam Coats, 13, likes jazz, especially Miles Davis; plays double bass in a jazz band and orchestra; reads a lot; and enjoys dissecting words, figuring out whether they come from Latin, Greek or maybe even French.

All that has brought him to where he is now: representing Ventura County at the Scripps National Spelling Bee near Washington, D.C., this week.

“I’m very excited about finally finding out how it’s going to go,” said Sam, a seventh-grader at Cabrillo Middle School in Ventura. “This is the culmination of what I’ve been working on.”

The bee will start Tuesday with a computer-based spelling test, followed by two preliminary rounds Wednesday. Semifinalists will be announced Wednesday evening, then take another computer-based test that night.

Semifinals and finals, which will be televised on ESPN stations, will be Thursday.

This will be Sam’s first trip to Washington and only his second time on an airplane. He’s looking forward to seeing the Capitol and exploring the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.

As for the bee, Sam has been preparing with his mother, Patty Veselich. She gives him words that are not on the bee’s official spelling list — words he’ll have to figure out on his own, just as he will at the bee. That’s when it’s key to understand a word’s roots, he said.

“Root words are essential for the national bee,” Sam said. “It’s difficult because you don’t know what they’re going to ask you, but you can ask about the derivation.”

Sam has more than intelligence going for him, said Sharon Schneider, one of his teachers.

“He’s obviously very smart, but he’s also very conscientious and caring,” said Schneider, who teaches English and social studies. “He’s not your typical seventh-grader, which is so refreshing.”

And he’s Italian — a heritage that makes him proud.

Sam’s dad, Ben Coats, comes from an Italian family, and Sam is an Italian citizen through a process his mother describes as complicated.

So has Sam ever been to Italy?

“We’ve been continually planning a trip there for years, but it never seems to come together,” Sam said. “I’m sure it will become fruitful eventually.”

That’s made for an ongoing joke in the family, Veselich said: “Sam is an Italian citizen who’s never been to Italy.”

Still, in the county spelling bee, that Italian heritage may have helped Sam with one spelling word: ziti.

That’s because his dad makes a fine ziti dish, he said.

“It was one of the simpler words,” Sam said.

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Bee bits

This year’s 281 competitors are divided almost evenly between boys and girls.

The youngest speller is 8; the oldest is 15.

Spellers range from second to eighth grades. Nearly half are in eighth grade.